Devices for manually dispensing medications have been proposed and put into practical use in the form of built-in components of medication sorting and packing apparatuses (see Patent documents 1 and 2). With such devices for manually dispensing medications, a preliminary dispensing cassette is detachably provided to a housing of the medication sorting and packing apparatus. The preliminary dispensing cassette has a cell structure in which a multitude of cells are formed such that they are horizontally and vertically aligned. Each cell (chamber) has a structure in which the top face is open, which allows medications to be inserted, and in which the bottom face/underside has a shutter mechanism or the like which provides a function of opening/closing the underside, thereby allowing the medications to be discharged. Furthermore, a delivery mechanism (conveyor) is included in the housing of the medication sorting and packing apparatus, underneath the preliminary dispensing cassette that has been inserted, and this delivery mechanism provides a function of receiving the medications discharged from the cells, and delivering the medications thus received to the packing device in increments of cells.
Furthermore, these devices for manually dispensing medications have a function of displaying the number of cells and the name of each medication. The display of the number of cells reduces the burden of the operation of the operator who has the responsibility of precisely checking the number of packs of medications. Specifically, LEDs are provided so as to provide a function of displaying a two-digit number. With such an arrangement, the number of cells are displayed. Alternatively, the number of cells horizontally and the number of cells vertically are displayed. Also, an LED is provided to each cell. With such an arrangement, the position of each cell is displayed via the light emission of the corresponding LED. Also, the LEDs are provided around the circumference of the cells. With such an arrangement, the light emission of the LEDs thus provided notifies the operator manually dispensing medications of the number of cells to be used. Furthermore, the display of each medication name is provided in the form of a printout from a printer, which at the same time also prints the reference number of the medication prescription to be dispensed manually.
[Patent Document 1]
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. Hei03-240604
[Patent Document 2]
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. Hei03-240603